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World champs in a hurry

Thursday, March 8, 2012 - Pictures by Badmintonphoto (LIVE)

World champions and former All England winners Cai Yun-Fu Haifeng (below), didn’t waste any time on the courts, cruising past Adrian Liu-Derrick Ng in 21 minutes to reach the second round on Wednesday.

The top seeds, who are seeking to retain the title they last won in 2009, were in dominant form as they scored a convincing 21-9, 21-15 victory.

It was a good day for the rest of the seeds in the men’s doubles as Jung Jae Sung-Lee Yong Dae, defending champion Mathias Boe-Carsten Mogensen and Koo Kien Keat-Tan Boon Heong (below), all won.

However, fourth seeds Ko Sung Hyun-Yoo Yeon Seong’s early season woes continued as they were knocked out by Taipei’s Fang Chieh Min-Lee Sheng Mu, who won 21-18, 21-16.

The Koreans suffered a shock first round loss at the last OSIM BWF World Superseries tournament – Maybank Malaysia Open presented by Proton –in January and were knocked out of last week’s Yonex German Open in the semi-finals.

Reigning Olympic and Asian Games gold medallist Markis Kido-Hendra Setiawan, who are making a late bid to qualify for the London Games, also made it to the second round.

The Indonesians are currently ninth in the world rankings, with teammates Mohammad Ahsan-Bona Septano and Japan’s Hirokatsu Hashimoto-Noriyasu Hirata in seventh and eighth spots respectively.

Meanwhile, in the women’s doubles, China’s Wang Xiaoli-Yu Yang and Zhao Yunlei-Tian Qing had no problems in the opening ties.

The top two pairs in the world dropped just 57 points between them as they warmed up for their coming matches with some scintillating display on the court.

Wang Xiaoli-Yu Yang, who created history last year when they won all the five Superseries Premier tournaments – Korea Open, All England, Indonesia Open, Denmark Open and China Open – defeated England’s Jenny Wallwork-Gabrielle White 21-16, 21-10.